meeting big deal dave
aka I love toronto part 2349823
Otters,
How’s everybody doing?! I honestly forgot to write earlier this week. I posted my Replacements essay in the relevant niche subreddit on I think it was Monday morning (which is when I usually send out my first post of the week) and it got, like, 25 upvotes. Which is a big deal to me, personally! I guess my brain misinterpreted that as me sending a post to all of you. But ICYMI you can read it here:
The Other "Let It Be" Turns 40
Canadian Thanksgiving is this weekend which has and will remind me to be grateful and thankful. And to slow down. And overall… just… relax. Trying to enjoy my life more instead of stressing out all the time about how I don’t have a boyfriend or a life and a career path and just kinda let all that fall into place.
This is likely the least busy I will be for some time. I know reading week is in two weeks but I might be moving (again) that week so it really won’t be very much of a break at all. I don’t have my big calendar-notebook with all my upcoming deadlines and events in front of me (it’s at home) but I know I have a bunch of midterms coming up in the next two weeks. At UofT (maybe other schools as well, you tell me) things get really crazy jammed after midterm season. Profs just friggin shoving entire encyclopedias of work in your face every week until exam season at the end of the semester.
I’m writing to you from the train, which as always is my favourite thing ever. I’m on my way back from Toronto for about the thousandth time in the last few weeks and yet it hasn’t gotten old. Every single goddamned time I get off the west exit at Museum Station, like I did this morning, you know, the one with the stairs that go up towards Queens Park, I am reminded of how much I love this city and how much it reminds me that there is joy to be found in being alive. Ok sorry I will stop pontificating now.
I went to a grad school info session the Department of English held last Friday, which I will prob write about one of these days. I also went to a lot of stuff I didn’t really find interesting enough to write a thousand words about: a comedy show near Dundas Square, the Toronto International Festival of Authors at the Harborfront Centre, two appointments with one of my eye specialists, this dope German bakery in the West End called Dimpflemier, this great fish and chip place along the Kingsway.
Today I met with Dave Kim, the Warden of Hart House. Truly a marvelous thing to type. I’ve mentioned Hart House before—it’s essentially UofT’s community centre / cultural hub / hangout central and easily my favourite spot on the St. George campus. It has something for everyone, even introverted oddballs with 2.8 interests like me. Dave runs the Hart House ship. He put out a call last month saying he wanted to meet with students or whatever and I said what the hell and I filled out a form and his staff set up a time.
It was so great, y’all. Dave is the most approachable, humble guy. Smart and knowledgeable as hell but also works his tail off to make UofT a better place. I think he liked me?! I was really trying to be witty and smart. I am always trying to make big deal people think of me as witty and smart, perhaps to my detriment, but idgaf.
Dave and I were only together for an hour but we talked about literally everything. His office is massive. It has two whole entire rooms. Maybe three. I didn’t check.
For someone who writes a Substack twice a week I am very bad at describing things but I am gonna try to describe his office. It’s full of pretty, wooden stuff. The first room has a sweet couch and then bookshelves on two sides full of yearbooks from old Hart House student committees and clubs. Plus a desk in the corner, lit up by the light coming through a giant window overlooking the Hart House quad, or what I refer to as the sickest backyard of all time:
People get their wedding photos taken here, I’m not even kidding. (Someone please marry me for the love of god.)
The second room has two armchairs and a little coffee table and another window, plus more bookshelves and also a few paintings. Then Dave’s desk is in the right-hand corner, all neat and organized, with a laptop and what I think was a giant notebook planner, plus two whole entire 30-inch PC-size monitors. I was very impressed by that double-monitor setup. (I am easy to impress.)
The west end of Hart House has a fancy restaurant called the Gallery Grill that I’ve never been to, but if you make a left from Dave’s office and go down the stairs you’ll find the Arbor Room, a hangout space that does coffee and pastries and I think sandwiches too but I haven’t gotten the chance to try yet. It’s always busy but not in the frustrating way other busy hangout spots on campus feel. Immaculate vibes, unlike anywhere in Mississauga. People are happy to see each other. The people who work there are lovely and they have great taste in music. (When I walked in with Dave, they were playing “Alameda” by Elliott Smith, which HAS to be a sign.) When I met Dave in his office, we were both itching for coffee, plus I told him I wanted to drink what the Warden drinks, so we walked over and got ourselves twin medium lattes with oat milk. First time in my life I’ve actually enjoyed oat milk.
Dave was recognized by maybe five different people in those five minutes. Profs, colleagues, students—he introduced them all to me. One of UofT’s…I think it was a VP or something, this dapper gentleman named Peter, was getting coffee too, and we shook hands and then I said something that made him laugh so that was great. Dave meets with everybody. It’s kind of his job. He’s been buying donuts in bulk to share with each of us from this donut shop in nearby Baldwin Village called Dipped. He gave me a Boston crème and then another caramel-something flavour on my way out. They were small and delicious calorie bombs of the highest order.
I obvs told Dave about myself (you know all of it already). Forgot to mention the Substack, unfortunately. I mentioned how St. George can feel ginormous but Hart House makes me feel like I belong at UofT and that I’m capable of charting my own path towards world domination. But more importantly he gave me such great encouragement about figuring stuff out, spoke about being Warden, and also touched on his time as a UofT student. He also mentioned he was at a party with these big-deal sports journalists the other night, journos who I have been huge fans of since I was a kid, and hearing about that was sick. He left the door open to meet me again sometime. It was too fun not to try to do it again.
Enjoy your Thanksgiving and see ya Tuesday.
I, too, was once a wide-eyed optimist at a different U of T. Thanks for reminding me.